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Justice News

Attorney General Jeff Sessions Selects District of Columbia To Receive Additional Prosecutor to Help Combat Violent Crime

WASHINGTON - Attorney General Jeff Sessions has selected the District of Columbia to receive additional resources for the fight against violent crime. The district will receive an additional Assistant U.S. Attorney to focus exclusively on violent crime, one of 40 new federal prosecutors in 27 selected locations throughout the United States.

“Led by our 94 United States Attorney’s Offices, Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN) task forces are hitting the streets across America to apprehend and bring violent criminals to justice. I have asked Congress for additional PSN funding because I believe nothing will be more effective at reducing violent crime,” said Attorney General Sessions. "Under this program, I am asking a great deal of our United States Attorneys. I am both empowering them and holding them accountable for results. To put them in the best position to impact and reduce violent crime, it is my privilege to announce that through a re-allocation of resources, we will be enlisting and deploying 40 additional violent crime prosecutors across the United States."

“These extra resources will help us focus on the most violent areas and offenders in the District of Columbia while still meeting our many other responsibilities,” said U.S. Attorney Jessie K. Liu. “We are grateful for the Attorney General’s support and look forward to getting our reinforcements to work on behalf of the citizens of the District of Columbia.”

The U.S. Attorney’s Office is working with the Metropolitan Police Department (MPD), the FBI’s Washington Field Office, and other law enforcement partners on a Justice Department initiative called Project Safe Neighborhoods (PSN) that is expected to generate additional cases focusing on violent crime. Under Project Safe Neighborhoods, the U.S. Attorney’s Office is committed to a coordinated law enforcement approach and identifying and addressing the most violent locations in the District of Columbia and the offenders.

Although the violent crime rate in the District of Columbia has generally declined since 2015, law enforcement continues to identify specific groups of violent offenders and “hot spot” areas within the city that correlate with significant violent crime. The hiring of an additional prosecutor will enable the U.S. Attorney’s Office to sharpen its focus on offenders in those hot spots and investigate and charge a wide range of offenses, including federal firearm offenses, Hobbs Act robberies, homicides, and racketeering conspiracies. The prosecutor will work with the Office’s Violent Crime and Narcotics Trafficking Section.

In addition to the District of Columbia, Attorney General Sessions has announced that each of these jurisdictions will receive additional prosecutors:

Northern District of Alabama - 1
Eastern District of Arkansas - 1
Northern District of California - 2
Southern District of California - 1
District of Connecticut - 1
Central District of Illinois - 1
Northern District of Illinois - 3
Southern District of Indiana - 1
Eastern District of Louisiana - 1
District of Maryland - 3
Western District of Michigan - 1
Eastern District of Missouri - 2
Western District of Missouri - 1
District of Nevada - 2
District of New Mexico - 1
Eastern District of New York - 2
Western District of New York - 1
Northern District of Ohio - 2
Eastern District of Pennsylvania - 1
Middle District of Tennessee - 2
Western District of Tennessee - 2
Eastern District of Texas - 1
Northern District of Texas - 1
Southern District of Texas - 2
Western District of Texas - 1
Eastern District of Wisconsin – 2